The Horror Thread 2U • Page 855

We all knew who the big slasher icons were when were little kids. I’m sure the majority didn’t ever see an actual scene with them until they were like 11-12 at a slumber party or something. lol

I bet half those kids won’t even end up seeing a Terrifier movie when they’re older.

 

I’m sure that’s true.

 

I am probably going to sound very Old Man about this topic, but I feel pretty loose about what kids can watch/celebrate on halloween. I was given permission to view damn near anything growing up (except for porn, of course). I saw so many fucked up movies at a young age and even dressed as Alex DeLarge from A Clockwork Orange when I was in just eighth grade. In retrospect, that is a wild move that my parents were just like "he enjoys the movie and he doesn't act like that character, so why not?".

Granted, there is a line but I think it's almost subjective. Does the kid act like Art The Clown in real life? Are they hurting animals, wetting the bed, suffering head trauma, or starting fires (all signs of psychopathy)? If not, then let them be and enjoy dressing as a character for a day.

 

I was pretty much allowed to watch anything as a kid as long as it didn’t have sex (lol). I do suspect if Terrifier had been around when I was young and my parents saw me watching it things may have been way different though.

 

I'm very unsure about what age to let my daughter watch anything horror because I'm hoping she'll be a fan but I don't want to affect her in any negative way. I guess I'll just see how much interest she has and go based on what feels right at the time. Probably start really tame and just slowly build it up.

 

I saw Halloween/Friday the 13th movies when I was way too young but that's because I had siblings who were 4+ years older than me lol. So I definitely saw some of those when I was like 5/6/7, maybe 8 at the latest. And of course i'd be told to "cover my eyes" at the nudity parts. Killing was fine though!

My son is 5 and I would not let him watch those until at least 10 years old I think. Terrifier I wouldn't show him at all and I've never seen them, just know what I've read about them. Extreme gore isn't really my thing so I don't feel the need to watch. Someday I'm sure I will.

At 5, I think the "scariest" movie I would let him watch would be something like BeetleJuice. We've had the Freeform 31 days of Halloween on pretty constantly so he's seen Hocus Pocus and Goosebumps 2 has been on there a lot. I feel like those are good ways to introduce him to the "spooky movie" genre without scaring him. I tried getting him to watch Beetlejuice but I don't think there's enough there early on to keep his interest. It also helped that when I was 5 years old, there was a Beetlejuice cartoon on so I had been introduced to the character and had a connection with them lol

 

I was also pretty much free to consume what I wanted, if it didn’t have nudity. I saw Scream when I was 6 and Blair Witch Project when I was 7. Granted my cousin showed me those when she babysat me but I don’t think my parents were ever mad at her for it. I saw Matrix Reloaded in theaters, but I had to cover my eyes during the sex scene. Gotta love some Irish Catholic mentality there. I would’ve been like 6 or 7 and already beat Metal Gear Solid and Resident Evil by then. Lmao

It just comes down to the child and the parents. If the kid is mature enough and the parents are responsible, then I think they can decide for themselves what works. Maybe hold off on Terrifier for a bit based on what I hear. Lol But if the child isn’t mature and the parents aren’t responsible, then yeah it’s probably not good. My parents raised me pretty decently I think and I don’t think any of my problems come down to watching R rated movies or playing Mature rated games when I was too young. Lmao

 

Start with the cartoon then! It’s streaming for free on Tubi.

But you raised another good point about how much horror we had in our childhood. Scooby Doo was my favorite thing since I was a baby. I was obsessed with every rerun on CN. And I would’ve seen Zombie Island the same year I saw Scream for the first time in 1998. Either way my path would’ve been the same. Lol.



Us versus them

 

I also feel like most of the kids I went to elementary school with who went as Ghostface with the bloody mask pump for Halloween probably hadn't seen Scream yet, but we all recognized the costume, so I'd agree most kids going as Art are more interested in the scary pop culture icon aspect of it than having seen the actual movies. But who knows, I guess. I can only hope my kid will like horror so I can introduce them to the kind of movies I deem appropriate at the time. That being said, while my parents weren't real sticklers about scary movies, I would say 80% of my early horror intake was at places where they had no real say or control, like sleepovers.

 

The Last Drive-In Halloween Special is this Friday, one of the movies is Satan's Little Helper

 

My kid is three and is obsessed with one of our neighbor's lawns that has Michael Myers and the puppet from Saw (He calls him Billy Saw) on it. My wife has tried to be like "hey dude let's not talk about it, that's for big kids", but that's backfired and made him more interested haha. He saw Art at Spirit Halloween and was fascinated, and then pointed him out to us again at a display in the mall. I'm not worried about it. I'm obviously not letting him watch those movies until he is much older, but I think it's okay for kids to be curious about things that are scary. I am 100% sure I knew about the horror icons back when I was that age, mainly because they were in store displays or on TV commercials. I didn't see any of teens movies until I was in middle school

 

Appreciate the heads up. wouldnt have known otherwise!

 

A side note (maybe related to seeing spooky stuff in the wild but probably just more that he's developing a stronger imagination), my son is convinced that there are three goblins that came into his room to try to take him. Woke up freaking out the other night about it. We've tried to tell him that goblins aren't real but he insists that not only are they real, there are three and one of them is nice. Last night he woke up and said that there was a robot in his room. I wonder if the goblins can ride on the robots, we'd be fucked!

 

well with that attitude you’re definitely going to get taken away by the goblins

 

Two of them have two horns (they are bad, they are trying to take him) and the one has three horns (he is good, he told the others to stop). It's very hard to convince him that they aren't real when he is going into so much detail.

 

You have the chance to do the funniest thing ever. I’m just saying.

 

I was thinking more ghoulies but trust me, I've considered it.

 

Do not, I repeat do not, show him Cat's Eye (even though it rules lol)

 

Looking for something a bit more light to do tonight with my wife. We're leaning towards Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. I feel like it was received pretty well in here, yeah?

 

I enjoyed it

 

Scooby Doo on Zombie Island

 

It's funny you mention that because she speaks freely about how overrated she thinks Zombie Island is. She always says that Scooby Doo and The Witch's Ghost should've blown up more. Or the Boo Brothers. I actually haven't seen either one but she forced me to watch The Witch's Ghost.

 

The Halloween Tree

 

Why’d you have to ruin my day with that? They’re all classics!

 

"My Mom's Got a Date with a Vampire"